1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a semiconductor integrated circuit, and more particularly, to a semiconductor integrated circuit including a reverse engineering protection part and a method for protecting against reverse engineering of an integrated circuit.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Semiconductor integrated circuits are often reverse engineered for the purpose of extracting circuits embedded in semiconductor devices. To prevent such reverse engineering, a variety of methods have been suggested. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,294,816 discloses a method of using implanted interconnections to replace metal interconnects to connect doped circuit elements. Since such implanted interconnections are not visible to SEM or optical viewing techniques, the purpose or function of the protected circuits are disguised from a reverse engineer. However, conventional methods for preventing reverse engineering require additional circuitry or additional processing.